My husband stopped trusting me with his PS3 after I burned three Netflix PS3 software disks (a known problem), so he asked me to get my Netflix kick with another device (that was before the disk-less PS3 solution). So I bought the $99 Roku XD|S, the highest Roku model, a Linux-based video streaming TV device.

Erm, no. There is no support for serious online services in Media Center apart from Netflix -- you can only view your own local videos (is there Youtube, Vimeo, Hulu, Amazon support?). TV is only accessible if you buy a TV tuner. Setting aside this, having to move off your couch to turn ON a PC that is possibly in another room, is not a living room experience. Personally, I hate streaming off of PCs for that exact reason. My PCs are in my office, and my living room is on the other side of the house. And if I was to have the PC on the living room, then it wouldn't be my main PC, which would mean that I would have to spend a LOT more than Roku's $99 to get a full PC just for media. In my opinion, Windows Media Center and all other streaming-off-of-the-PC solutions are lacking in terms of user experience. Same goes for Apple's new AppleTV, where they removed the HDD.

I don't appreciate comments without substance btw. You just wrote these "three words", and you left us in our devices. I spent quite some time writing this article, so some basic respect for this would have been nice, in the form of actually expressing your thoughts and opinions in a more verbose manner, where it could stimulate real discussion. Just because "this is the internet" does not give you a free pass.

I use PlayOn - it is installed on my Quad-core PC downstairs and streams to my PS3 in the living room. It has Hulu, Netflix, Amazon, CBS and many others. There are plug-ins for other services, too. It does a good job of aggregating all of these services and presenting them in a nice interface. I was going to cancel my DirecTV. Instead, since I was out of contract, I called and negotiated my service to a basic package at half the price.

There is a PlayOn Beta app for the Roku. You'll have to dig around to get the code for that channel. It works alright - you can watch Hulu, etc.., with the PlayOn app. It's not as smooth as the other Roku channels, but that may be because of the PC that I have PlayOn installed on.

It depends on the plugins you have. Out of the box the support is limited. But it's easy to expand.

As a base nothing can best it on live tv/dvr capabilities on Windows. It's very easy to use, and there are no extra fees. And ability to share with extenders or other Windows machines (Win7 only) is a great plus.

And, adding plugins for YouTube, RSS/Vodcasts, Hulu, and even Boxee/XBMC is very easy. I believe there is even a PlayOn plugin as well.

However you need an entire PC with a large hard drive, and powerful processor/gpu.